Accrual accounting and Australian fiscal policy

Australian governments have recently moved from cash accounting to accrual accounting. Accrual accounting has been accompanied at the national government level by the introduction of a new key fiscal policy measure: the ‘fiscal balance’. This paper explains and evaluates this new fiscal measure. It concludes that, given the present fiscal policy of the Australian government, fiscal balance is a superior fiscal policy measure to the ‘cash’ budget balance measure which it replaced. However, from the alternative ‘golden rule’ policy standpoint, fiscal balance is not a meaningful fiscal policy measure — although its stock counterpart, net financial liabilities, certainly is.     

Borrowing to Finance Public Investment? The ‘Golden Rule of Public Finance’ Reconsidered in an Endogenous Growth Setting*

In this paper, we look for long‐run and short‐run effects of fiscal deficits on economic growth and welfare in a standard endogenous growth model. We show that, under very general hypotheses, the ‘golden rule of public finance’, which allows a government to run public‐investment‐oriented fiscal deficits, leads to a lower balanced‐growth path in the long run, and eventually in the short run, compared with balanced‐budget rules. Welfare effects are more difficult to assess, and depend on the form of the utility function. Our model shows that debt rules such as the golden rule may improve (if the consumption elasticity of substitution is ‘low’) or weaken (if the consumption elasticity of substitution is ‘high’) intertemporal welfare. Consequently, a balanced‐budget rule does not necessarily dominate debt rules from the point of view of welfare, while it does from the point of view of long‐run economic growth.     

Accrual Accounting,Informational Sufficiency,and Equity Valuation

This paper studies accrual accounting and equity valuation in the context of a firm that makes repeated and overlapping investments in productive capacity. The analysis identifies a particular accrual accounting (depreciation) rule that is termed replacement cost accounting because the book value of existing capacity assets is set equal to the value that such assets would have if a competitive market were to exist for used assets. It is shown that replacement cost accounting aggregates past investment decisions of the firm without a loss of value‐relevant information. The intrinsic value of the firm can then be expressed as a function of current accounting data and certain parameters of the firm’s operating environment. Further, it is shown that replacement cost accounting is essentially the only accounting rule with this informational sufficiency property.     

Evaluating the Implementation of a Mandatory Dual Reporting System: The Case of Indonesian Local Government

Informative and transparent financial information in the public sector is crucial for improving public sector management and eradicating corruption. Given this, Indonesia has reformed its public sector accounting, reporting and accountability systems by implementing a dual reporting system known as ‘cash towards accrual’, following similar reforms in developed countries. Drawing on the experience of five local governments (districts) in Indonesia, this study finds that the implementation of the dual reporting system has helped local governments to produce transparent and informative reports. However, the accrual‐based contents of the dual reports produced by the new reporting system are underused for decision making. In addition, there has been a significant increase in costs associated with the implementation of the new accounting regime in the jurisdictions studied. The study also finds that the ability of the users to use information generated by the new accounting system is more important than just a legal and mandatory requirement to use the new system.     

Accruals and ‘accounting numbers management’ in UK executive agencies

Public sector reforms have implemented business techniques, including management by results, cost management and accrual accounting, to make public entities more efficient and accountable. As a consequence, ‘accounting numbers management’ has become a way for managers in the public sector to adapt accounting figures to their interests. This study focuses on ‘earnings management’ (manipulation of earnings) in government agencies. The authors provide evidence of earnings management in which agencies try to keep net operating costs to around zero. The authors' findings question the effectiveness of financial targets associated with accrual-based measures.     

论预算会计收付实现制及其改革

客观评价我国预算会计收付实现制确认基础，探讨其局限，借鉴OECD国家预算会计权责发生制改革实践经验，结合我国实际，研究和探索我国预算会计如何运用权责发生制，是理论界和实务界面临的重要课题。     

我国政府会计权责制改革初探

随着“新公共管理运动”的兴起,改革政府会计引入权责发生制逐渐成为世界上许多国家的共识.而我国经过30多年的改革开放,市场经济环境已经发生了巨大变化,尤其是政府职能的转换、公共财政体制的改革、政府绩效评价制度的建设等,均对反映政府经济活动的政府会计信息提出了更高的要求,实行政府会计改革、引入权责制的呼声也日益高涨.本文从...     

The Implementation and Use of Benchmarking in Local Government: A Case Study of the Translation of a Management Accounting Innovation

Benchmarking is a management accounting innovation (MAI) that can be used for performance measurement and management in both the private and the public sectors. Although public sector accounting researchers have reported some success with the use of benchmarking, frequently charged problems exist in implementing and using this management technique. To look beyond the technical and institutional explanations, this paper takes a translation approach and presents a case study of a local government benchmarking network. We conclude that there is a link between benchmarking implementation problems and initiators’ failure to build a strong network of benchmarking allies. Implementation is facilitated if actors, other than the initiators, recognize the possibility of making benchmarking more relevant and less cost focused. However, even when a network of actors has a favourable attitude towards benchmarking, benchmarking may still appear as an unruly ‘actant’. Furthermore, the perception of implementation failure and success is heterogeneous and connected to various actors’ adoption of benchmarking. We also conclude that there is a connection between the use of benchmarking and 1) actors’ possibilities to use benchmarking in the struggle for resources and 2) the perception of benchmarking information as ‘factual’ or ‘factual enough’. However, the perception of benchmarking information as ‘factual’ or ‘factual enough’ seems not only a matter of correct or incorrect ratios but also of whether such information serves actors’ interests. A final conclusion is that the use of benchmarking increases when actors other than the initiators complement the original idea and ‘counter interest’ the initiators.     

Application of Accrual Accounting in the Australian Public Sector – Rhetoric or Reality

This paper presents a contextual. historical analysis of recent accrual accounting developments in the Australian Public Sector (APS). It takes a critical stance in that it questions the accrual accounting developments on a number of grounds. The paper examines changes in public sector financial management and accountability in four distinct settings, being: accrual financial reporting, accrual management systems, whole of government reporting, and accrual based budgeting. The findings show that already in Australia accrual accounting has made significant encroachments into some areas of annual financial and budget reporting. This influx has meant that terms such as 'deficit', 'debt', 'liabilities', 'operating results', 'assets', etc. have begun to change in meaning, which it is argued has important implications for the current process of transformation of aspects of the APS.     

CREATIVE ACCRUAL ACCOUNTING IN THE PUBLIC SECTOR: ‘MILKING’ WATER UTILITIES TO BALANCE MUNICIPAL BUDGETS AND ACCOUNTS

Traditionally, the financial balance of public sector economic entities has been determined by balanced budgets and cash‐based or modified cash‐based budgetary accounting. Since the 1990s the superiority of accrual accounting in the public sector context has been emphasized by both practitioners and academics. This paper demonstrates that accrual accounting also offers opportunities for the use of creative accounting, or earnings management, in the public sector, at least as long as accounting is performed in accordance with diverse national norms instead of internationally acceptable accounting standards.     

Accounting change and value creation in public services—Do relational archetypes make a difference in improving public service performance?

Evidence points out that the outcome of accounting change in local governments is not simply a matter of ‘corporate’ resource investments and change management activities to accounting system replacement. This paper examines the link between such corporate-level interventions and the patterns of value creation at street-level. It emphasizes a resource- and capability-driven approach to explore processes and consequences of an ‘embedded agency’-effect assigned to the street-level rationale of public service improvement. Considering a logic chain of cause-and-effect sequences, the data analysis provides evidence that corporate and street-level interventions are unique dimensions to signify the multiple patterns of accounting change in local governments. The supplementary effect of cross-functional relationships is also distinguished, considering the relational archetype as a mechanism to explain the emerging outcome state. Recognizing the distinction and the sequential effects of relational archetypes induces a refined typology of accounting change according to its processes and outcomes in local governments. The analysis is based on a comparative case study design to explore accrual accounting introduction in six German municipalities.     

Framing public governance in Malaysia: Rhetorical appeals through accrual accounting

In government, the challenges of governance and anti-corruption are exacerbated by accounting not being fit for purpose. In developing countries, many governments adopt accrual accounting as a panacea. Drawing on Goffman's frame analysis, and rhetorical appeals to logic, credibility and emotion, this paper examines the adoption of accrual accounting in Malaysia. It was found accrual accounting has potential for keying governance and anti-corruption. However, rhetorical appeals that attempt to legitimate neo-liberalism and engender public support in the name of progress were hindered by perceptions of endemic corruption and relatively weak democratic institutions of ‘good’ governance common to developing countries.     

政府会计基础比较研究——传统的收付实现制与崛起的权责发生制,孰优孰劣?

传统上 ,政府受托责任的核心是反映政府部门预算执行情况以及支出是否符合有关法律法规要求 ,这一定位并不完全适应剧变了的经济环境的内在要求。在当今经济全球化的大背景下 ,政府受托责任的具体内容与形式发生了根本性的变化。是关注现金流以做到切实遵守预算 ,还是注重资源及其使用以提高效率和效果 ,这种由不同的公共管理理念决定的会计目标差异 ,必然导致不同的会计技术选择 ,更直接地说 ,它决定了政府会计方法基础的选择。本文通过对两种会计基础的深入研究 ,认为在政府会计领域采用传统的单一会计基础有一定局限性 ,应该借鉴国际经验有选择地进行权衡取舍 ,循序渐进地实施相关改革。     

Public Investment,the Stability Pact and the ‘Golden Rule’

The fiscal rules set in the Treaty of Maastricht and in the Stability and Growth Pact have sometimes been criticised as an excessively binding constraint for appropriate counter‐cyclical action. The risk that the rules may permanently reduce the public sector's contribution to capital accumulation has also been pointed out. In this framework, the adoption of a ‘golden rule’ has been suggested. Starting from the recent debate, this paper tackles two questions: (a) the implications of the Pact for public investment and (b) the pros and cons of introducing a golden rule in EMU's fiscal framework, given the objectives of low public debts and adequate margins for a stabilising budgetary policy. The analysis suggests that the rules set in the Treaty and in the Pact may negatively influence public investment spending. However, the golden rule, although intuitively appealing, does not seem to be an appropriate solution to the problem.     

Fair value accounting and the present value fallacy: The need for an alternative conceptual framework

The major functions of company accounting identified by the IASB and the FASB are (1) reporting on ‘the custody and safekeeping’ of the company's resources and (2) reporting on ‘their efficient and profitable use’. The joint IASB/FASB project for improving the conceptual framework for financial reporting is directed towards better performance of both functions within the conventional ‘accrual’ system of accounting through the use of ‘fair value’. Although the disclosure of fair values is a development to be welcomed, the requirement that changes in fair value should be reported as ‘gains’ or ‘losses’ appears to rely on the ‘Hicksian’ concept of income as a theoretical ideal.The object of the present paper is to establish that this concept is fundamentally flawed by what may be called the ‘present value fallacy’. Even in an economic utopia of perfectly competitive markets (with no discrepancies between objective market values and subjective present values), the concept of income or profit as value growth can be seriously misleading.If the prevailing Hicksian conceptual framework is discarded in favour of an alternative based on Fisher's theory of income, the two major, but incompatible, functions of financial reporting can be carried out independently and without compromise. The conventional ‘hybrid’ system of accrual accounting, in which backward-looking measures of volume and forward-looking measures of value are mixed together, would be replaced by a ‘segregated’ system in which they are kept strictly apart. A logical extension of Fisher's theory suggests the disclosure by agent/managers of the return on investment that they are planning to deliver to their principal/owners. This type of ‘decision-useful information’ is vital for the efficient operation of capital markets and for removing the accounting incentive to short-termism.     

The Use and Abuse of Accounting in the Public Sector Financial Management Reform Program in Australia

Accrual accounting has been central to financial management reforms designed to promote greater efficiency, effectiveness and accountability in the Australian public sector. This is the setting for the article; however, the issues covered apply to all nations that have reformed their public sectors over recent years. The results of the reforms have been mixed. While accrual accounting has had some beneficial results for the above purposes, the benefits have been offset by aspects of accounting misuse resulting largely from adoption of the business model of accrual accounting, termination of the former cash accounting system, and adoption of some questionable marketization reforms which appear to be more driven by the objective of reducing the size of government rather than enhancing efficiency of operations. Because Treasury believed that the business model was not appropriate for budget fiscal policy purposes, it introduced a second combined accrual and cash accounting system—the Government Finance Statistics system. The use of two accrual accounting systems reporting different results caused much confusion in parliament.     

ACCOUNTING REFORMS: DETERMINANTS OF LOCAL GOVERNMENTS' CHOICES

The introduction of accrual accounting in Italian Local Governments has been mandated in a way that permits, and in fact encourages, a merely formal compliance. Local Governments must produce accrual‐based financial statements, but double‐entry bookkeeping is not mandatory, nor may traditional budgetary accounting be abandoned. Why, then, should they bother to introduce an integrated system of budgetary and accrual accounting? In this paper, we empirically investigate the determinants of Local Government's choices of accounting innovation. According to our results, ‘rational’ elements such as complexity, types of activities performed, presence of surpluses, and access to capital markets are seemingly unhelpful in explaining why a Local Government decides to introduce accrual accounting. What counts are ‘institutional’ and cultural explanations, such as the perceptions of CFOs and the North‐South divide.     

Federal capital expenditures and budget deficits: Gross national product and labor implications

The issue of separating capital from operating expenditures has been largely ignored in discussions of the U.S. Federal Government's deficit. This paper attempts to overcome this void by conducting a simulation experiment designed to assess the macroeconomic consequences of separating capital from current expenditures under several alternative balanced budget rules and financing arrangements. The alternatives considered are directly related to management accounting issues and thus the purpose of this paper can be seen as compatible with the literature on the relationship between accounting techniques and economic analyses. The results of the study reaffirm the need for federal capital investment planning.     

Fiscal incentives and political budget cycles in China

Political budget cycles in democracies have been extensively analyzed, but few studies of non-democracies exist. This paper explores political budget cycles in China’s provinces. Using data from Chinese provinces from 1980 to 2006, the analysis finds that the effects of a provincial leader’s tenure on political budget cycles are minimal, implying a weak causal relationship between spending composition and a politician’s time in office at the provincial level. However, there exists a national coordinated cycle associated with the timing of the National Congress of the Communist Party (NCCP). Two years prior to the NCCP, politicians are likely to shift public spending toward capital expenditures, such as innovation funds and capital construction, and away from current expenditures, such as agricultural subsidies. The opposite pattern occurs during the year of the NCCP, when politicians increase current expenditures, such as social expenditures and government administration, and decrease capital expenditures. The increased capital expenditures 2 years prior to the NCCP are accompanied by an increase in taxation and total aggregate spending. The empirical results indicate that provincial budget cycles are mainly driven by national policies rather than by provincial leaders’ personal career incentives. Chinese leaders’ fiscal behaviors are constrained by the dynamics of the national leadership transition, resulting in similar distortions to those found in the democratic countries.     

Decision Usefulness of Cash and Accrual Information: Public Sector Managers’ Perceptions

This study examines the usefulness of accrual accounting information for internal decision‐making contexts in the Western Australian public sector. Based on questionnaire responses of public sector managers, it was found that accrual accounting is perceived to be more useful than cash accounting in 16 of the 19 decision situations. These results suggest that the perceived usefulness of the accrual accounting system has improved with the passage of time. It may well be that perceptions of the usefulness of information derived from an accounting system will change over time as users gain familiarity and experience with a system.